Dungeon Forum FAQ

Disclaimer: this thread will change and update frequently. Come back and check it out daily if you’re curious about changes!

First of all, Welcome!
This post is to help new people to the community understand this subforum. Please note that it is up to each individual to keep posts clean and respectful. Before posting a thread, make sure your question is not on this thread. If you wish, Ask your question here, and we can answer it here, as well, and add it to this list. Any questions asked here will be added and their answer will be put in. Enjoy!
Let’s get started.
FAQ:

[Meow] Can I bring a non-80 into a dungeon that is “level appropriate”?

Can I bring a non-80 into a dungeon that is “level appropriate”?
Lowbies are perfectly capable of completing a dungeon run of the appropriate level
We all know this to be true. However, be aware that although lowbies are capable of completing a dungeon, this can sometimes not be as quick as groups want.
A good way to solve this problem is to either find a group willing to help, either by posting on LFG or joining a lowbie friendly LFG group, or by finding someone on the forums who is willing to show you the ropes.These groups do exist. They often fill much quicker on the LFG, and thus there doesn’t seem to be as many on there as there are “Pro speed Zerk etc ones”.
Be aware that there is nothing wrong with a lowbie dungeon group, it will just be slower, and will require more patience and time allotment. As you improve, it will go faster, and you will become the veteran.Important Information Because of the way stats scale when levels are scaled down, having gear, as close to your level as possible, is very important. A level 45 character in level 35 gear will do worse in AC Exp than a level 35 character in level 35 gear, and therefore a level 45 character with level 45 gear will do much better.
This is a good way to ensure that you are as prepared, character wise, as you should be.

What is the purpose of LFG group descriptions?
Descriptions are there for a reason. If you are running a lowbie group, post something like “Anyone welcome”. It will fill. Because more people are able to join these runs, they will often fill quickly. Read the descriptions. If a group is looking for a heavy armor, a berserker, an experienced player, and you do not match the description, don’t join the group. It’s perfectly fine for you to start your own group that does not have such requirements.
It’s never a good idea to try to impose your dungeon running requirements on someone who doesn’t wish to play that way. There are plenty of people on both sides of the court. Find people who think similarly, and you will have enjoyable dungeon runs.

What should I do if my group kicks me for my build or profession?
The first question that should be asked is this: What did the group description say when you joined? If it did not say anything, and the group did not say anything at the beginning of the dungeon, (and you were kicked in the middle or toward the end) you can report. However, something may or may not come of it, because it is a party’s decision whether to kick or keep players. If they were breaking the terms of service, however, they can get in trouble, and justice might be met. If they kick you toward the beginning, though this isn’t the best thing, it’s better they did it then than much later, wasting more of your time.
If the group description described what they wanted, and you joined despite not filling the requirement, that’s something different. Remember to read the group description before joining.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

What should I do if my group kicks me to sell my spot?
If you have proof of this happening, chat records, screen shots, names of players, report it to Anet. They will help you far more than the players here can.
Be aware that it is against the EULA to name shame on the forums, so do not post anything with names.

Is dungeon selling against the rules?
It is not against the rules if the solo/duo completed the run legitimately. However, if the seller kicked members, or used exploits, it Is against the rules and should be reported.

What can I do to mitigate time-loss by issues such as: Instance owner leaving, getting kicked for no reason, and having a group that does not know what to do in an instance?
It is a good idea to always have yourself, a friend, a guildie, etc, be the dungeon opener. This will cause much less heartache when someone rage quits, because if it is you who opened, the instance will not be destroyed. There is no guarantee for this to ever be 100% fixed due to disconnecting, party merge bugs, and other issues that can cause the destruction of an instance.
If you pug a lot, it may be beneficial to screenshot your party’s names. This can help clear up confusion if someone griefs you or your party.
If you are interested in being prepared for a dungeon path, watching a youtube run might be very beneficial. If at least one person knows what to do, either via a video or guide online, the run will go much more smooth.

How can I find the best build for dungeon running?
A lot of people have their own builds in their signatures. If you cannot find the meta build for the class you want to use, you can post a thread asking for the current build of x class. The forum dungeoneers will give you the “Meta” build, which often relies on the highest DPS for a party.

If I struggle with the best build, what are the best alternatives?
If you want advice on how to best use the meta build, or tweak it because you need extra survivability, the dungeon forum regulars will give you their best advice (usually along the lines of knight’s gear, but it depends. Be aware that if you are asking a question wanting advice, it is up to you to take it.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

Where can I find someone to help me run a dungeon path?
Dungeon veterans are willing and able to help dungeon newbies
There are several posts here on the forums, here are a couple examples: Dungeon Mentors and specifically for Arah, Arah Vets. In addition, see the sticky at the top of the forums. More recent threads may be more useful, but it is still very much a tool to be used.

What should I do if I’m new to a dungeon and join a non-descriptive dungeon run?
Always let your group know that you are new and listen to instructions, if they have any. The worst thing to do is not say anything. People are generally very nice and want to help! But they can’t if they don’t know you need it.

Can I do the dungeon on a level 80, and switch to a low level character toward the end to get the experience?
You can do this, however, make sure to indicate to your party that you intend on doing this. If someone has an issue with it, and start a new party. Make sure if you plan on doing this that you do not start the instance, as your party will be kicked from the dungeon and your instance will be destroyed.

What can I do if I am kicked from an instance due to the dungeon starter leaving the party?
If you are kicked due to the dungeon starter leaving the party, there is no way to recover your instance. You must start the instance over, or move on. If this is done maliciously, very far into the dungeon, you have some grounds for reporting. However, if it is a disconnect or something similar, it’s an SOL moment.
On this same subject, if you start an instance, make sure you allot the time needed. There is no worse feeling than leaving your party high and dry because you suddenly have to leave the game.

Q: If I find a bug or exploit, how can I report it to Arena Net?
If you discover a bug, check out This Thread to make sure it hasn’t already been found. If it is a bug, post it to that thread to be added to the master list along with the ticket numbers you used when reporting it to Arena Net. If it is an exploit, report the details to exploits@arena.net, and place a non specific description in the thread, with ticket numbers and report details. As these things get fixed they will be crossed off the list.

Q: Ah! My dungeon speed clear video has been moved to Linksville! What gives?
The rules of the dungeon forum regard posts of links as “not discussion oriented”. The official word on this is:

The thread must be a discussion post. As in “XYZ and I decided to do ABC. We did 123, and when we did LMNOP. What do you think? Was it really fast? Was it awesome? Feedback wanted” or a whole discussion of why they did the run, what the video is about and such.

In the future, avoid posts that are just links of videos with “such and such point of view” and such. Let’s keep our dungeon runs in the dungeon forum!

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

Q: I just ran a dungeon, and everyone just bunched up on top of each other in a few corners to fight the mobs. What gives?

A: What you saw is a combination of two strategies: LoS’ing (Line of Sight’ing) and stacking. There are a few reasons why people use these tactics.

1) With LoS’ing, groups often hide behind a door or crack in the wall or corner after getting aggro from a mob: the mobs will then all follow and turn around that corner at the same spot. If the entire group is standing together in one spot— stacking— then the group can use their AoE burst skills and the cleaves from auto-attacks to very quickly destroy all the mobs. Often, classes with pulls and pushes (mesmer focus 4 in particular) use those skills to further help bunch up enemies and make the AoE skills more effective.

2) Bunching up your party means that you and your fellow players are better able to support each other. Small-radius party buffs like might stacking from blast finishers on fire fields are guaranteed to go off on the entire party when everyone is together, dramatically raising the damage your party is capable of. Relatively “small” area skills, like Feedback or Wall of Reflection, are able to protect the entire team. AoE blinds affect all the mobs at once, since they are in the same location. If one person goes down, the other four are able to immediately pick them up.

3) Some stacking locations, in particular for bosses or encounters with environmental effects, provide some protection from the mechanics of the fight. Some force bosses to use weaker attacks (AC spider queen); others are outright safe spots from some of the mechanics (AC P3 boss, Molten Facility weapons testing boss).

The combination of these three points means that for many fights in the normal dungeons of GW2, stacking on top of each other is the optimal strategy. Note that stacking does not mean you simply stand in the corner and press your auto-attack: you must still have situational awareness of your enemies to avoid their damage, especially since you are not moving! This means using active defenses when you see an attack coming (Aegis, blocks, evades), dodging into the wall for evade frames, chaining projectile reflection and/or blinds, etc. This requires skill to pull off!

Subject Alpha in Crucible of Eternity is a good example of a boss most people will fight by stacking against a wall. Naively, this seems like a bad strategy, since you will not be able to walk/blink out of his very deadly AoEs. However, intelligent use of blocks and evades means that people can avoid all of the damage, even without moving. At the same time, the party is doing more damage because everyone is at melee range and providing buffs for each other— therefore Alpha goes down faster, and you need to do less dodging in the end.

Remember that stacking is simply a strategy that tries to reduce the time it takes to kill mobs so that your chance of dying goes down and your gold per hour goes up. Many PUGs are going to use at least some stacking/LoS’ing to make encounters easier, and in most groups that do not otherwise specify you will be expected to stack along with the team.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

Q: Stacking is awful! Isn’t this an exploit? Why doesn’t ANet fix this? What can I do so I don’t have to use this mechanic?

A: Many of the stacking strategies people employ have been common practice for more than a year. As best as we can tell, ANet does not consider this an exploit, as they have been notified of it many times since the game has been released and have not done anything to change it. Keep in mind also that stacking was a common strategy in GW1 and was also accepted by ANet there. In that game, mobs even tended to walk out of AoE’s, but people would simply pull them in again to continue the stacking damage. It is likely that even if ANet, for example, changed the AI to not clump as much, players would simply use more control skills to force mobs to gather together just like in GW1.

Keep in mind that calling stacking “bad” is in the eye of the beholder. The use of active defenses and team support that stacking promotes is fun for many players. However, if you do not want to use these strategies for whatever reason, you have two main options:

1) Make your own groups, and look for like minded individuals. You can put in your LFG something like “Read first: NO STACKING!!! AC P1” and people who do not want to stack will join you. The group will take longer to fill than a normal group, but you will almost certainly be able to find a full party. Since you started the party with the intention of not stacking, feel free to kick people who did not read your description and insist on doing so.

In time, you may even form a network of friends that like to run dungeons without stacking. Running with friends is the best way to play dungeons anyway, and this way you can guarantee that everyone has the same expectations for your run.

2) Play content that does not reward stacking. Most of the normal dungeons do encourage stacking through their design, and so you will see most runs through them involve this strategy. However, Fractals of the Mist are a good example of content where stacking rarely helps. With the exception of some of the trash fights, most battles are done in the open field (and importantly, I believe that none of the bosses has an effective stacking strategy). You won’t be able to avoid stacking entirely, but at least you will be able to play most fights without it.

Note that starting a thread in the dungeon forum about stacking is very unlikely to help you. Some people will agree with you, others will disagree, lots of typing will happen, but nothing will change. Taking the positive steps mentioned above is the best way to make sure you can get the GW2 experience that you want.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

Q: Everyone in my group just ran past all the trash mobs! Aren’t we supposed to kill monsters in dungeons? Isn’t it cheating to just run through?

A: What you just saw is called “skipping.” Robert Hrouda, a former designer at ANet, gives a great summary of the topic here . He explains the reasons why people skip very well, and the post is worth reading.

Paraphrasing Robert, everything is related to time spent vs. reward earned. Trash mobs take quite some time to kill, and give rather poor rewards (lots of sticky gobs are not particularly exciting). Since you can skip, and most of the time this is faster, it doesn’t make sense for players to fight most of the trash mobs. There is just no incentive to do so. ANet recognizes this, and allows players to skip, as Robert’s post shows.

Keep in mind, also, that some mobs spawn infinitely (this is particularly common in Arah). You can never stop and kill everything— you have to run! Skipping has been built into the core dungeon mechanics by ANet with these infinite spawns— ANet intended for skipping to be part of the game, so it is certainly not cheating. People often just use this same tactic in other places as well.

Now, we can imagine a world without skipping— what would it look like? ANet could simply turn off leashing of mobs, and they would always follow. What would happen to dungeon runs? Well, first: people could drag them all across the dungeon into the best location to fight them. There would always be some corner which you could bring the mobs to, drop your AoE’s, and destroy everything at once. That is not much of an improvement— the mobs are still trivialized. Alternatively, people would just use stealth. Every team would require one or more thieves (imagine the LFG posts: LF thief ONLY) so that they could still skip past mobs, since at the end of the day, skipping with stealth would still be faster. This is hardly an improvement either: ideally all content in the game can be completed with any class composition, and powering up stealth play like this would make the game less egalitarian.

ANet could always turn up the incentives for killing mobs: having them drop better loot is a great way to do this. For example, the destroyer trash in Crucible of Eternity is often fought because they drop T5 and T6 claws— the drop rate is not super high, but high enough that people generally think it is worth the time. Another example is the practice of killing trash mobs to get stacks of bloodlust or perception before fighting a boss— in this case, killing trash helps your effectiveness in fighting the bosses, and people are often very happy to do it.

At the end of the day, as Robert summarized over a year ago now, it is a matter of incentives. There is usually no benefit to fighting trash, so people understandably decide not to do it.

Q: Doesn’t it take zero effort to skip? Isn’t it unfair for this reason?

A: Just because skipping takes less time, does not mean it is trivial. Mobs can use knockdown, cripple, chill, and immobilize effects to prevent you from running. A successful runner knows the tells from mobs and knows when to dodge, when to use stability, when to cleanse conditions, when to blink, when to use a bit of stealth, etc. Groups will coordinate swiftness and aegis and other shared resources. People often switch equipment (to something with centaur runes, for example, for extra swiftness) or weapons (movement with a warrior’s sword/warhorn is easier than the preferred DPS weapons of axe/mace). Running is another form of challenge in this game, and it can be quite fun to do it right.

Q: I still don’t like skipping! What should I do?

A: You are not alone! While most people seem fine with skipping, people post in the dungeon forum complaining about skipping more than once per week on average. The simplest thing to do is very clear in your LFG posts: say things like “READ PLEASE: NO SKIPPING. Path 1” and feel free to kick people who do not follow your description. But the best thing, as Robert mentioned in the point above, is to find others who agree with you, and who you can reliably run your dungeon with exactly how you want to. Keep a list of people who join your groups for no skipping runs, look for guilds which do not skip, look for other posters on the dungeon forum. Trying to convince people who like skipping won’t be very effective: the most productive thing you can do is to reduce conflict and play with people you know you can count on.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

Should we have one about stacking or dungeon tactics in general? like why stack, what is it’s purpose and so on? or is that too much of a grey area?

Also yes good luck!

Tactics is not something I’m all that knowledgable about. I think that would be a helpful thread that someone (like you!) might want to start. The issue there is avoiding the awful “exploit” accusation, as many people consider certain things exploiting when they may or may not be.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

I would suggest you do not post specific dungeon guides, builds, solos videos in FAQ with only 1 exception, Wethospu’s gw2dungeons.net.
Wethospu’s guide is a complete general guide about dungeons w/ pertinent information about monsters and bosses. Just advise them to search for specific guides of dungeons or builds if they incline. You will eliminate many headaches coming from making decisions what are good, what are bad and arguments coming your way later.

I would suggest you do not posting specific dungeon guides, builds, solos videos in FAQ with only 1 exception, Wethospu’s gw2dungeons.net.
Wethospu’s guide is a complete general guide about dungeons w/ pertinent information about monsters and bosses. Just advise them to search for specific guides of dungeons or builds if they incline. You will eliminate many headaches coming from making decisions what are good and what are bad coming your ways later.

This is a good point. I’m trying to make this thread for everyone, so anyone else concur? I’ll gladly put Weth’s guide, but should we avoid builds and such at the moment, or at least in this thread?

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

Try to advice about positional awareness or stacking strategies. Only stack is like the worst habit to destroy a community since it creates the habit of faceroll and when something hard like Aether appears, the community gets lost. But also is needed in some fights, like Alpha in Crucible of Eternity, as example.

Try to advice about positional awareness or stacking strategies. Only stack is like the worst habit to destroy a community since it creates the habit of faceroll and when something hard like Aether appears, the community gets lost.

I’m trying to avoid tactics in this thread. I recommend you start a thread regarding this on your own.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

I love those, but again, I really think they belong in a different thread. This is a guide mainly for the forums about general problems. Tactics is not something I think is good for this thread. For a dungeon running FAQ yes, but not for the forum FAQ.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

I think gw2dungeons.net will cover how to handle what i was referring to as tactics earlier. As Skychef said I think this this should be the only guide listed in the FAQ the guide needs to be concise to keep it from being derailed.

As Lilith Ajit has said Stacking can be controversial because some people do see it as an exploit so on a good day it’s a grey area. There should probably be a separate stickied topic on why we stack. Stacking itself is a playstyle that should only apply to this FAQ in the LFG section if at all. If it’s a speed run stacking is implied, like skipping trash mobs, if you don’t want to stack you should say so in your LFG.

Talking too much about builds could also derail the FAQ, Anet will make changes and builds will be adjusted as time goes by so there is no definitive answer on builds either.

I think gw2dungeons.net will cover how to handle what i was referring to as tactics earlier. As Skychef said I think this this should be the only guide listed in the FAQ the guide needs to be concise to keep it from being derailed.

As Lilith Ajit has said Stacking can be controversial because some people do see it as an exploit so on a good day it’s a grey area. There should probably be a separate stickied topic on why we stack. Stacking itself is a playstyle that should only apply to this FAQ in the LFG section if at all. If it’s a speed run stacking is implied, like skipping trash mobs, if you don’t want to stack you should say so in your LFG.

Talking too much about builds could also derail the FAQ, Anet will make changes and build will be adjust as time goes by so there is no definitive answer on builds either.

I agree. Would like more feedback from folks like DeSade, Spoj, Katana, etc. I really want this to be everyone’s thread. So we can get the information out there without clogging up the forum with posts that are answered here.

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

- Could you elaborate on the profession as well? In this case, build and profession are distinct things, but the result/actions are identical.
- Could you also specify whether this happens before the run has started or after? If it’s before the dungeon has started, it’s still be acceptable (bad, but acceptable). If the dungeon has started, it’s griefing.

Also, I think we often have these complaints about the following topics, maybe we should address them here:
- Asking before the run starts if it’s ok to switch characters at the end of the dungeon.
- Leaving the instance while being the owner is a kind of grief (until it’s fixed). You addressed this, but you ask only “what can I do?” after it’s done, you do not insist on preventing it.

You have to assume people are slow, since they are.
And since they are, you better…

What should I do if my group kicks me for my build or profession?

edit a bit this part, because they’ll assume they can report left and right everytime they get kicked from a party that doesn’t want them. Reports are uneffective anyway…
You could mention verbal abuse can be reported, so maybe they won’t come here crying because someone’s been mean to them.
You could mention the fact some paths are harder than others and even that it’s recommended to look for a decent guild to help them through. Yep, I got paid by some guilds to do advertisement.Specify the differences between story and explorable modes.
We’d need another stickied thread with the common courtesy and the commonly used tactics in dungeons… but that’s another story. Hm.
Mention that the party chat erases when they kick you/you leave, why? sentence 1.
You should at least mention that most parties will run past some mobs, leaving him behind and do weird things that a newbie won’t understand. Just as a reminder.
Since you wanted to leave out tactics and such, it looks uncomplete and won’t prevent them from spamming the forum when Kholer butchers them… but I guess it’s better this way.
Dunno why I’m even trying to help since I should be mad… nevermind.

(usually along the lines of knight’s gear, but it depends. Be aware that if you are asking a question wanting advice, it is up to you to take it.

Party chat is wiped on instance change not leaving the party. Its a design limitation, not intentional afaik. So if you get kicked and it auto ports you out of the instance its going to wipe that chat. If you get kicked outside of an instance it will stay. Might be worth mentioning when talking about party chat getting wiped.

It’s usually a test of my endurance… eh, I mean… patience. I’m guilty of kicking or agreeing to kick a couple of people during the dungeon. So, I’m curious about everyone else’s case and what is best to do so not to grief other fellow dungeoneers.

“Raids are like fortune cookies. You eat the cookie and then read the paper scraps.”

I kick when they don’t read the LFG, which happens most of the time. After a few more rounds of kicking morons and failing to get people who understand the LFG, my group either gives up and allows them in/does the dungeon with fewer people.

There’s no reason not to kick people if they don’t read the LFG, and they have no right to complain. Of course you shouldn’t be kicking people at the end of the dungeon/fractals, unless in an exceptionally severe case (e.g. if the player is a complete kitten and is preventing progress).

Also, staff ele is totally a legit and extremely strong build. Then again, if they’re using other attunements in combat/camping at long range they’re probably not doing it right.

Can I bring a non-80 into a dungeon that is “level appropriate”?
Lowbies are perfectly capable of completing a dungeon run of the appropriate level
We all know this to be true. However, be aware that although lowbies are capable of completing a dungeon, this can sometimes not be as quick as groups want.
A good way to solve this problem is to either find a group willing to help, either by posting on LFG or joining a lowbie friendly LFG group, or by finding someone on the forums who is willing to show you the ropes.These groups do exist. They often fill much quicker on the LFG, and thus there doesn’t seem to be as many on there as there are “Pro speed Zerk etc ones”.
Be aware that there is nothing wrong with a lowbie dungeon group, it will just be slower, and will require more patience and time allotment. As you improve, it will go faster, and you will become the veteran.

A little point about that, personally I’m not against it, I do it quite often myself to level characters. There is however one thing you should take in mind when doing this, it is highly recommendable to get you armor up to par with your level, since this will make quite some improvement to you being able to stay alive and to dish out damage. I did notice especially when you get side kicked with equipment that is not up to par your damage and survivability will get reduced allot, which might cause trouble for both your own dungeon experience and the experience of the people you did group up with.

Can I bring a non-80 into a dungeon that is “level appropriate”?
Lowbies are perfectly capable of completing a dungeon run of the appropriate level
We all know this to be true. However, be aware that although lowbies are capable of completing a dungeon, this can sometimes not be as quick as groups want.
A good way to solve this problem is to either find a group willing to help, either by posting on LFG or joining a lowbie friendly LFG group, or by finding someone on the forums who is willing to show you the ropes.These groups do exist. They often fill much quicker on the LFG, and thus there doesn’t seem to be as many on there as there are “Pro speed Zerk etc ones”.
Be aware that there is nothing wrong with a lowbie dungeon group, it will just be slower, and will require more patience and time allotment. As you improve, it will go faster, and you will become the veteran.

A little point about that, personally I’m not against it, I do it quite often myself to level characters. There is however one thing you should take in mind when doing this, it is highly recommendable to get you armor up to par with your level, since this will make quite some improvement to you being able to stay alive and to dish out damage. I did notice especially when you get side kicked with equipment that is not up to par your damage and survivability will get reduced allot, which might cause trouble for both your own dungeon experience and the experience of the people you did group up with.

Made the edits, what do you think of them?

[ARES]And all who stood by and did nothing, who are they to criticize the sacrifices of others?Our blood has bought their lives.

I tried my hand at a little guide on when a kick is justified and what to do if you’ve been kicked.

When to kick people:

When PUGing dungeons you will come across players who don’t meet your requirements. People may join your “speedrun ping zerk gear” group with cleric gear or a lowbie character in trash gear. When this happens a kick is definitely justified. However, this may be both frustrating for the kickers and the kicked, so try to make LFG posts as clear and concise as possible to prevent misunderstandings.

A kick may also be justified in the event that a player is deliberately obstructing progress and griefing the party. For example, if a player is deliberately picking up the hammer in the Cliffside fractal, screwing things up and isn’t responding to instructions, it is justifiable to kick the player.

Help! I’ve been kicked!:

If you were kicked immediately upon entering the dungeon, try and reread the LFG. Did you mistakenly join a speedrun PUG on a lowbie? Your class may be one that is less desired in PUGs (necro, ranger to an extent). You may have joined a “HEAVIES ONLY” PUG on a light armour class. In any case, it’s NOT a big deal. You haven’t even started the path. You wasted a little bit of time, but that’s an unfortunate reality of pugging.

However, it’s different if you were kicked at the end of the path. When kicked at the end, you should recall the names of the people in the party. If no good reason is provided for the kick it’s probably reportable as griefing.

To minimise the likelihood of getting griefed in PUGs, you might want to open the instance yourself. Normally this will deter people because kicking you will destroy their progress as well. Be wary when you join groups that are mainly from the same guild – it’s possible that they are looking for people to grief. When entering more time-consuming dungeons like Arah and FOTM, you may want to note down/screenshot the names of everyone in the party, so you can report them if they kick you.

I haven’t had any personal experience with griefers though, so you may want to find someone else to rewrite that bit.

should probably add http://gw2lfg.com/ to the FAQ in the event that the in game LFG goes down as it has now, or as an alternative. I had completely forgot about it until LFG was disabled and Cat Has Ducks mentioned it in another thread.

Stacking and skipping may deserve their own sticky separate from the FAQ. You could probably put them together in one topic. I was thinking about this but I don’t know how to write one without burning the place down, but I am not the keeper of the FAQ so maybe it can be worked in here.

Q: I just ran a dungeon, and everyone just bunched up on top of each other in a few corners to fight the mobs. What gives?

A: What you saw is a combination of two strategies: LoS’ing (Line of Sight’ing) and stacking. There are a few reasons why people use these tactics.

1) With LoS’ing, groups often hide behind a door or crack in the wall or corner after getting aggro from a mob: the mobs will then all follow and turn around that corner at the same spot. If the entire group is standing together in one spot— stacking— then the group can use their AoE burst skills and the cleaves from auto-attacks to very quickly destroy all the mobs. Often, classes with pulls and pushes (mesmer focus 4 in particular) use those skills to further help bunch up enemies and make the AoE skills more effective.

2) Bunching up your party means that you and your fellow players are better able to support each other. Small-radius party buffs like might stacking from blast finishers on fire fields are guaranteed to go off on the entire party when everyone is together, dramatically raising the damage your party is capable of. Relatively “small” area skills, like Feedback or Wall of Reflection, are able to protect the entire team. AoE blinds affect all the mobs at once, since they are in the same location. If one person goes down, the other four are able to immediately pick them up.

3) Some stacking locations, in particular for bosses or encounters with environmental effects, provide some protection from the mechanics of the fight. Some force bosses to use weaker attacks (AC spider queen); others are outright safe spots from some of the mechanics (AC P3 boss, Molten Facility weapons testing boss).

The combination of these three points means that for many fights in the normal dungeons of GW2, stacking on top of each other is the optimal strategy. Note that stacking does not mean you simply stand in the corner and press your auto-attack: you must still have situational awareness of your enemies to avoid their damage, especially since you are not moving! This means using active defenses when you see an attack coming (Aegis, blocks, evades), dodging into the wall for evade frames, chaining projectile reflection and/or blinds, etc. This requires skill to pull off!

Subject Alpha in Crucible of Eternity is a good example of a boss most people will fight by stacking against a wall. Naively, this seems like a bad strategy, since you will not be able to walk/blink out of his very deadly AoEs. However, intelligent use of blocks and evades means that people can avoid all of the damage, even without moving. At the same time, the party is doing more damage because everyone is at melee range and providing buffs for each other— therefore Alpha goes down faster, and you need to do less dodging in the end.

Remember that stacking is simply a strategy that tries to reduce the time it takes to kill mobs so that your chance of dying goes down and your gold per hour goes up. Many PUGs are going to use at least some stacking/LoS’ing to make encounters easier, and in most groups that do not otherwise specify you will be expected to stack along with the team.